Visual Basic 2005 for Dummies

by Bill Sempf

Visual Basic is Microsoft's premier programming language, used by more than three million developers and in 50 million Windows applications Programming pro and veteran Wrox author Bill Sempf has thoroughly overhauled the book's organization and content, making it even more accessible to programming beginners Highlights new VB features and functions, including important advances in compatibility with older VB versions Offers plain-English explanations...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 076457728X
• ISBN13: 9780764577284
• Release Date: November 2005
• Publisher: For Dummies
• Length: 362 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 7.5" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

GREAT PLACE TO START

I am an absolute novice to Visual Basic for Aplications. This book opened my eyes very quickly and made me feel like a genius in hours. It is very clearly laid out and the examples are fantastic and so easy to follow. The book comes with fantastic online support, so you not only get to sit at your computer and learn but you get to join a family and workshop your individual issues. Do yourself a favour and increase your knowledge in hours, buy this one.

Excellent Quick Start tool

I'm new to Visual Studio and found that I was spending most of my time just trying to figure out the user interface. The practical examples in this book were just what I needed to get up and running in a hurry. Also the book's web site has each chapters' sample code, feedback links, and an Errata page for after print corrections.

Excellent Book

I am not new development but I try to read books of all levels. Knowing the author of the book I was curious and I like to read intro books like this to help when I mentor developers. I can compare what they know to what is contained in the book. If well written, I suggest the book, and this is a certainly a book I recommend. It lays out the topics I think are required especially in Part II. Was very happy to see Chapter 6 - Building Class Libraries because too often beginner books make it seem as if class libraries are not an entity to themselves but a piece of either win forms or web forms in .NET. I think this will make it much clearer to the novice. The chapter on debugging distilled the info to a good level to make someone effective instead of overloading with everything Visual Studio can do. Part III covered specific topics that I would not want to explain on my own. The information is readable and not over done. Part IV goes on to pickup some topics I would not have thought to include. Not every new developer will need to read these, but having these simple examples to refer to will be especially helpful to someone who is new to .NET but with some background in Visual Basic. Part V along with all the tips in the books, and the cheat sheets make this book even more valuable. If you are on the fence about this book, pick it up off the shelf at a local book store to get a feel for Bill's writing style. I think the conversational feel of the text makes it much nicer than the other books of the same technical depth on the topic.

Good Starting Point

Though I have a little bit of VB 3 experience from many years ago, I am essentially a new VB programmer. I think this book provides a good overview of getting started with VB 2005. There is more reading than coding as you work through it, but the code examples work (at least the ones that I have tried) and the chapters cover a wide range of useful aspects of VB 2005. It gets into some of the nitty gritty of Loops, Types, etc. But it also steps back to look at overall program design, logic, and other broader concepts. The book mostly lacks the silly humor that some of the other dummies books have, which some may like or dislike. The writing is clear and easy to understand, and the pace is easy to follow along with. The author provides examples of code along the way, but doesn't throw anything at you without explaining what is going on. I purchased the acrobat version of the book to use on a pocket pc, which seems to work fine. If you read it on a pocket pc, be sure to turn reflow off and on as needed. If reflow is on, you can make it much more readable. However, some of the tables may get mixed up and many of the code examples might not show up until you turn reflow off.

Great book.

As an experienced .Net programmer I like to keep in touch with the beginning books so I know what kinds of problems I will have to correct in a programmer. I like that way this book is laid out and takes the reader through the language. I also like that all the code in the book I have tried so far compiles, this will make the book much more enjoyable for the new programmer. I would recommend this book for anyone that is new to .Net.